Lonely Planet's top destinations for 2014

By Frances Cha, CNN

Updated 4:12 AM ET, Tue October 29, 2013

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Best value destination -- Greek Islands – Lower prices, fewer tourist numbers, the same incredible ancients sights that have been there for centuries. The Greek Islands in 2014 offer "remarkable value," says Lonely Planet in its Best in Travel 2014 rankings.

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Top 10 countries to visit in 2014 -- Scotland (3) – It's going to be an eventful year for Scotland ... Lonely Planet listed the XX Commonwealth Games in Glasgow next summer and the country-wide Year of Homecoming celebrations for Scottish ex-pats returning home to visit as just some of the reasons why Scotland came in third.

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Top 10 countries to visit in 2014 -- Antarctica (2) – Second place actually went to a continent, not a country, for its pristine, unexplored territories and incredible scenes of wildlife. The timely factor? Next year marks the centenary of the start of polar explorer Ernest Shackleton's Antarctic expedition.

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Top 10 countries to visit in 2014 -- Brazil (1) – This one's a no-brainer -- the 2014 World Cup in arguably the most soccer-obsessed country in the world makes for a remarkable travel experience. "Tack on a recession-dodging economy and boom! Brazil is the belle of the ball," says Lonely Planet on why Brazil tops the list of countries to visit.

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Top 10 regions -- Yorkshire, England (3) – From the happiest place in Britain (Harrogate) to the world's first UNESCO City of Film (Bradford), Yorkshire is giving London some fierce, inventive competition as a destination.

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Top 10 regions -- The Kimberley, Australia (2) – Travelers who want to get away from other travelers should look to this seemingly endless, open region, which is also one of world's most sparsely populated areas. The difficulties in getting around ("croc-infested, almost impossible to travel around without a 4WD, and mostly inaccessible during wet season") only adds to its appeal.

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Top 10 regions -- Sikkim, India (1) – It's an intriguing choice. Sikkim tops the list of regions to visit for its "responsible travel" -- it's India's cleanest state, and the government also plans to turn it into a fully organic state in the near future. Couple that with a new airport opening next year, and Sikkim makes it to the top of the regional rankings.

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Top 10 cities -- Cape Town (3) – Reasons why Cape Town has been designated the World Design Capital for 2014: sculpture-filled parks, makeovers for former industrial districts and many a design-oriented sustainable project.

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Top 10 cities -- Trinidad (2) – The second most must-visit city for 2014 is "a sherbert-tinged, time-trapped" UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the "extraordinarily beautiful result of a 19th-century sugar boom," says Lonely Planet, touching on the city's sad legacy of importing African slaves. A series of celebrations has been planned for next year's 500th anniversary of the city's foundation by Spanish conquistadors.

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Top 10 cities -- Paris (1) – A new car-free zone from the Musée d'Orsay, new bells in the Notre Dame, beautiful exhibition after beautiful exhibition being planned in mansions and museums all over the City of Light. It would be strange if Paris wasn't at the top of the list.

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Story highlights

Annual Lonely Planet Best in Travel guide published Tuesday

Reasons for choices include major events/celebrations coming up plus "x-factor"

Brazil tops list for best countries to visit. Sikkim, India voted best region

The rationale: Well the first is pretty obvious since Brazil is hosting the World Cup. It's the centenary of polar explorer Ernest Shackleton's Antarctic expedition, while Scotland's nod is mainly due to it staging the Commonwealth Games in the summer and celebrating the Year of Homecoming for overseas Scottish. A great accent probably also helps.

Published this week, Lonely Planet's ninth annual roundup of best destinations around the world for the upcoming year was based on "scores for topicality, excitement and that special x-factor," as determined by their inhouse experts and outside writers.

And there are a few surprises. The quiet, peaceful, pretty and sometimes (unfairly) maligned Adelaide in South Australia made the top 10 cities for 2014 (possibly because of some of those adjectives). The ranking prompted this response from an Australian media outlet: Was Lonely Planet drunk when it rated Adelaide?

The travel guide went with Paris as the best city next year (it didn't make the top 10 last year), with Trinidad in second place (January marks the 500th anniversary of the foundation of Trinidad) and Cape Town coming in third.

In terms of regions as destinations, Sikkim in India was voted the best, for "showing the way for what could be the future of India's tourism industry."

Some more notable predictions included Hunan region as "the next big thing" in China and the Greek Islands as the best value destination due to recently lowered tourism prices and fewer tourist numbers.